September 10, 2009

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The unsigned, five-page, English-language official Iranian response delivered in Tehran yesterday to the ambassadors of the international group seeking to curb Iran’s nuclear program contains a “package of proposals” and indicates that Iran is ready to enter into negotiations, a diplomatic source tells POLITICO today.

But, he judged, “it is not a serious response,” the diplomat said. “It doesn’t really address the clear problem,” and makes no mention of the international community’s chief concern, Iran’s nuclear program, he said.

“Even in the past, Iran has shown readiness to talk about some aspects” of its nuclear program, he said. But this response contains “nothing on that.” Consistent with recent Iranian government statements, it treats the Iranian nuclear program as “a closed issue," he said.

Political directors of the U.S., UK, France, Germany, Russia and China are due to confer by conference call in the coming hours on the Iranian response, U.S. and western diplomats indicated. There was already a consensus assessment among western members of the so-called P5+1 that the emerging Iranian position was not likely to be prelude to serious negotiations in the near term, the diplomat said.

UPDATE: State Department spokesman PJ Crowley described early U.S. reaction to the Iranian response at the briefing today:

It is not really responsive to our greatest concern, which is obviously Iran’s nuclear program. We are consulting with our other P-5+1 colleagues. There will be a conference call tomorrow involving the political officers to talk about next steps.

As our ambassador in – to the IAEA, Glyn Davies, said very compellingly yesterday, he reiterated, as we continue to, that we are willing to engage Iran in direct diplomacy based on mutual respect and mutual interests, and we seek a willing partner. But I think that as we consult with our P-5+1 colleagues, we’ll be looking to see how ready Iran is to actually engage, and we will be testing that willingness to engage in the next few weeks. [...]

In the package yesterday, Iran reiterated its view that, as far as it is concerned, its nuclear file is closed. And as Ambassador Glyn Davies said very clearly yesterday, that is certainly not the case. There are many outstanding issues. Iran has failed to meet its obligations, has failed to cooperate sufficiently with the IAEA. So we remain open to direct dialogue with Iran. If we can get to that point, we would expect to engage on the full range of issues, including our concerns about Iran’s nuclear ambitions. ...

Crowley said the P5+1 political directors would confer tomorrow. But one western diplomat said the P5+1 members had conferred today as well and expected the White House might have a statement Friday.

And the PostinterviewsMojtaba Samareh Hashemi, political advisor to Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. "Asked whether Iran's proposal contains any mention of suspending its uranium enrichment program, Samareh Hashemi said that 'methods of preventing development of nuclear weapons and a widespread system for preventing . . . the proliferation of nuclear weapons are a part of the package.'"

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Iran sees Obama as weak....very weak. Consequently, they know he will likely salivate over their phony lets negotiate overture. Its just a stall tactic by Iran while they develop nuclear weapons. Israel will be forced to take care of the Iranian problem as they will get no help from Obama. And make no mistake about it, they will take care of it.

The goal of Iran is pretty apparent. Keep the west off balance the same way north korea does, by feinting some "diplomacy" and continuing to develop their nuclear weapons in secret. The Obama adminstration doesn't care what happens, because their focus is on embedding the institutions of socialism and curtailing free speech here in America. By the time Obama is finished with his first term, it will be againat the law for white Americans to make statements critical of Islam, illegal aliens, or "people of color". The idea of freedom is alien to the democrats. What they believe in is control, not freedom.

Um . . . it was Bush who handed the middle east to Iran on a platter, by failing to realize what the consequences would probably be of removing Saddam. Robert Baer (The Devil We Know) writes that Saudi and the rest of the Gulf states are probably toast--and Iran will end up controlling about 55% of the world's oil. So they don't really need a nuke, they just need to consolidate the gains they have made. Baer recommends we deal with them, by the way, since they are rational actors and want control of their region, not nuclear annihilation.

Iran does not even have enough tech to build their own petrol refinery. They could never refine uranium on their own. It was Russia who built the centrifuges in Iran. Now Putin says no sanctions, no air-strike. Meanwhile, Iraq is economically, and politically aligning with Iran largly to get free of U.S. heavy handedness. Looks like Russia is winning "The Great Game."

hello? does anybody see what is happening here? netanyahu visits russia secretly, then the europeans want an 'urgent' meeting with iran, then the americans agree to talk as well ... about nothing... what is obviously about to happen is that the israelis are ready to go (notice that there has been almost no comment from israel for the last 2-3 months on iran...just ominous silence) and the americans and europeans are now desperate to stop this, because it will lead to a major economic disaster.